NATIONAL

A child born in South Africa does not automatically qualify for South African citizenship if their parents are foreign. According to Advocate Priscilla Jana, deputy chairperson of the South African Human Rights Commission (SAHRC), the organization has been unaware that unabridged birth certificates were not issued to such children. Following confusion and disappointment after the implementation of the unabridged birth certificates visa regulations for minor travellers going in and out of SA, the SAHRC now says they will review why children born in the country to foreign parents are not automatically awarded citizenship by the Department of Home Affairs.

Cape Town – Every day‚ dozens of asylum seekers queue outside the regional Home Affairs office at Customs House in Cape Town to get their temporary permits renewed. Most of them are unsuccessful. The Home Affairs branch only services applications for refugee status. The site is marked by high fencing topped with barbed wire‚ forcing applicants to queue just off the premises under a lifted section of the N2. There are no restrooms. Vendors have set up shop selling warm drinks and food to applicants who will wait all day.

You stand in a queue from five o’clock and after standing in a queue they open around eight‚” Pierre*‚ a 37-year-old Congolese refugee‚ told GroundUp. He had visited Home Affairs twice in the past week with no success. “After opening at eight o’clock they take papers‚ they don’t care who came first or who came last and then they go inside.”

On Tuesday 04 – 04 -2017, hundreds of people from Johannesburg’s immigrant community were joined by South African civil society organisations in a march against xenophobia. Organised by the African Diaspora Forum, the march was to bring South African and immigrant communities together and promote unity.

While recognised refugees have little to worry about from Government’s inspection of businesses not in compliance with the ’60 percent employ South African rule’, it is their colleagues and peers, who do not understand their right to work that has them living in fear. Prepping for the lunch time rush is a welcome distraction for Max Birindwa* a restaurant manager at one of Pretoria’s favourite eateries. He is one of several refugees employed at the popular chain store in an equally well-liked shopping mall in South Africa’s capital. Many South Africans would assume that he is one of the thousands of foreign nationals employed in the hospitality, construction and mining sectors, which have been accused of widespread non-compliance with legislation stipulating that at least 60% of their staff comprise South African citizens.This has given rise to serious concern from individuals, communities and Government, particularly the Department of Home Affairs, which is to embark on a “‘mass inspection’ of businesses countrywide to ensure they complied.”

REGIONAL

The world has become a hostile place for refugees. The narrative often used to justify such actions is national security. What then happens where an individual is considered a security threat to a state they wish to gain access to? Is that state still obliged to accept the individual, or to continue hosting them? This is a dilemma for countries that host refugees. The cornerstone of international refugee law is the principle of non-refoulement. This obliges states not to turn away individuals who have a well-founded fear of persecution, or substantial grounds to believe that if returned to a particular country they would be in danger of torture, inhuman or degrading treatment.

Djibouti is a tiny, coastal country that has for centuries been situated at the confluence of numerous and multidirectional flows of traders, travelers, scholars, laborers, and refugees back and forth between the Arabian Peninsula and the African interior. The Red Sea’s Bab el Mandeb Strait, between Djibouti and Yemen, is only 20 miles across in places, enabling relatively easy intercontinental travel. With a population of fewer than 900,000 people, today Djibouti hosts 22,640 refugees and asylum-seekers. That equals 2.5 percent of its entire population.

As the United States and some European countries add ever more isolationist policies, closed borders, and dramatic curtailments in the number of refugee resettlements, what can we learn from how this small country facing considerable security and economic threats from abroad treats humans on the move?

By the time Dawit arrived in Ethiopia aged 29, he had been twice arrested and imprisoned by the Eritrean government. We met Dawit in a refugee camp called Adi Harush in Northern Ethiopia, where he had settled nine months earlier, hoping to build his future in the host country. Despite being a qualified health professional, his hopes were quickly dashed by the limited employment options in Ethiopia. He could not find a way of supporting himself, let alone his ageing parents back in Eritrea. Ethiopia is a leading country of asylum in the region. Dawit is one of more than 700,000 refugees in the country.Western governments are eager to keep them there and are increasingly using aid to prevent or reduce irregular onward migration.

If you are a refugee in Africa, Uganda may be one of the better spots to be one. Newcomers are allowed freedom of movement. They can own their own businesses. And Ugandans, for the most part, are welcoming. From the refugee settlements of northern Uganda, VOA’s Jill Craig reports on the country’s unique refugee policy and how it came about.

INTERNATIONAL

The Oscar-nominated Italian documentary Fire at Sea is more than a story about the migrant crisis. First and foremost, it’s a movie about Lampedusa. Lampedusa is a tiny island off the coast of Sicily, where boatloads of migrants from Africa and the Middle East arrive every year — a temporary stop between war and famine, and the hope of a new life in Italy and Europe.

How can big data analytics help map the trends in ongoing migration, describe the sentiments in the countries involved, or predict areas of conflict? There are many ways of doing big data and it is crucial we get it right in the context of migration aid.